Hillary Clinton has already been accused of running a Mickey Mouse campaign in her run for a New York senate seat this November - her latest blunder was to fail to leave a tip after eating in a restaurant - but further evidence emerged yesterday when it was revealed that her biggest cash backers were the employees of Walt Disney.

Mrs Clinton raised at least $437,000 (£272,500) from the entertainment industry last year - $56,550 from Disneyland - second only to the number of contributions from those in the law field.

Lawyers, a traditional Democrat constituency, gave $667,000. They have particular reason to be grateful to the Clintons, who have so far paid $5.9m in fees for their various legal battles and who still owe $4.3m.

The first lady and her opponent, Rudolph Giuliani, the mayor of New York, aim to raise $25m each to finance their campaigns for the seat in the US senate, making it the most expensive electoral race of its kind.

Mrs Clinton may have the big names, but Mr Giuliani has the big money. By the end of last year Mrs Clinton had raised $8.07m but her rival easily topped that with $11.78m. Both spent most of their money on mailshots asking for more cash.

She says that he is taking money from extreme rightwingers around the country; he has not yet formally announced that he will run. Bruce Teitelbaum, Mr Giuliani's campaign spokesman, said: "Hillary's Hollywood pals are paying big bucks to elect someone from Illinois and Arkansas to represent the people of New York. Maybe she should run in California."

Howard Wolfson, spokesman for Mrs Clinton, said the volume of contributions from the entertainment industry came because she was "a champion of the arts". "She's running against a guy who tried to shut down a museum," he added.

This was a reference to Mr Giuliani's attempt to withdraw funds from the Brooklyn Museum of Art because it hosted the Sensation exhibition of works by young British artists. The mayor took particular exception to the work of Chris Ofili, the Turner Prize-winning artist whose painting the Holy Virgin Mary was created using elephant dung.

Styron's choice

Mrs Clinton's starrier list of contributors also included members of the literati, such as William Styron, author of Sophie's Choice, and his wife Rose who gave $3,000 between them. Jean Auel, who wrote Clan of the Cave Bear, gave $1,000 and even Gail Sheehy, whose biography of Mrs Clinton was none-too-friendly, came up with $500.

Tina Brown, the British editor of Talk magazine, came through with $1,000 - a month after publishing the interview with Mrs Clinton that helped to generate a buzz for the first issue.

Not all the offerings were so unequivocally fragrant: Sean "Puffy" Combs - also known as Puff Daddy - the rap music entrepreneur who gave $1,000, has just been charged with bribery. He already faces firearms charges.

Mr Wolfson said that the Clinton camp had no intention of returning Puffy's money. "We believe in the presumption of innocence," he said.

But Mr Giuliani's roll-call of the Republican establishment also accommodates supporters in keeping with his combative personality. Among them are Mike Ditka, one of the most widely disliked coaches in professional football, and Charlton Heston who, in addition to his responsibilities to the cinema audience, is president of the National Rifles Association. Paradoxically, the caustic Mr Giuliani is in favour of tighter gun control.

Like Mrs Clinton, Mr Giuliani has supporters in the gay community: she has Elizabeth Birch, executive director of the Human Rights Fund ($2,000) and Virginia Apuzzo of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force ($1,000); he has members of the Log Cabin Republicans ($3,000).

The mayor has also received money from prominent restaurateurs in New York City, including Warner LeRoy who reopened the Russian Tea Room recently, and Sottha Khunn, the chef at Le Cirque 2000.

Each candidate has designer supporters but other kings and queens of the catwalk hedged their bets. Oscar de la Renta, for instance, gave $1,000 to the mayor and to Mrs Clinton. Nicole Miller found $2,000 for him and $1,000 for her.

However the contest is not being fought exclusively at the level of who can attract the most famous followers. Mrs Clinton's camp has accused Mr Giuliani of allying with the extreme right because his fund-raising letters were written with the assistance of Richard Viguerie, whose record includes helping Jerry Falwell to set up the rightwing group Moral Majority 21 years ago. "If these are Rudy Giuliani's allies, what kind of senator would he be?" Mr Wolfson asked.

But Mr Teitelbaum said: "It sounds an awful lot like sour grapes. They fell way short of their fund-rising goals and we broke records."